There is a puzzle associated with the existence of Faho. The ordinary local speech of Sìbǎo — not Faho — is notorious across the whole of Liánchéng county because everyone claims to find it incomprehensible. Why would people whose neighbors already cannot understand them need an extra layer of secrecy in the form of a secret language?

Chao, Yuen Ren. 1931. 反切語八種“Eight Varieties of Secret Language Based on the Principle of Fanch’ieh”]. Academia Sinica, Bulletin of the National Research Institute of History and Philology (Peiping) 中央研 2, no. 3:312-354.